a visitor

Who's a lucky boy? Ja ha... That'd be me. I recently had a visitor drop in for a couple of weeks. My girlfriend, Belle, visited me in Göteborg.

It was time to share my knowledge of Swedish customs (lunch at 11:30am), language (tjena! hur är läget?), and food (inlagd sill). Of course it was a lot of fun showing off the city I'd been living in for the past four months, so far away from her and Melbourne.

First of all I had to serve some traditional Swedish foods. I served a mid-summer's style meal of inlagd sill, otherwise known as picked herring in English. Remember it's sill, and definitely not seal! Also served up with some fresh potatoes, boiled. Some of the herring was excellent, some of it not so.

Typically during the day we'd meet each other for lunch, as I was still working during the day. Something different in Göteborg compared to Melbourne is the ferry across the river, so typically we'd be catching that to meet in either Lindholmen or Järntorget. During the first week the weather looked pretty threatening, but usually it kept from raining too much.

It didn't stop us from checking out the sights around town, including walks along the canal, visiting the animals in Slottskogen (a large park) and going for after work drinks along über-trendy Avenyn.

Although the weather isn't always this cooperative in summer, in Sweden, luckily for us the weather did improve. The second week of Belle's stay was sunny and, would you believe it, hot!? Now it was time to get out an enjoy the best Göteborg has to offer. Personally I think the best activities are the outdoors ones too:

• cruising in the archipelago
• a picnic next at Delsjön
• outdoor dining in Haga
• drinks in the sunshine along Avenyn

We went on a cruise in the archipelago. It combined the lovely views of Göteborg's southern islands at sunset, and a wonderful summer meal: salmon, mussels, and as much shrimp as you could fit in (or be bothered shelling!). Highly recommended when in Göteborg (in summer... with good weather).

walkabout in london

As Wimbledon drew to a close for another year, I decided it was time to visit London. Touching down late on Friday night, I got the grand tour from Stansted in the North East to where Carmen lives, Wimbledon, in the South West. Similar to going from Melbourne Airport to Frankston, this took about an hour and a half.

After a justified sleep in on Saturday it was time to take "the tube" to see one of London's most famous sites: the Tower of London.

The Tower is not a single tower, rather it is a fortress (with 4 towers), surrounded by two defensive walls. The walls have many more towers.

The complex has plenty of strange, interesting and bloody-thirsty history to offer. Not only that, it also stores some impressive collections of historic weaponry: from suits of armour to bayoneted rifles.

A funny tradition at the tower, is that a minimum of six ravens need to roost in the grounds, otherwise legend has it that the tower will crumble and the monarchy will fall. Of course this is the first time I'd heard of ravens being crucial to the structural integrity of a building and the general well being of a family, but you never know I guess. Just to make sure the legend is never tested, they keep eight or nine ravens there. Not superstitious at all; just cautious. :-)

Of course to complete any self-respecting royal fortress, you require royal guards. The British have pretty distinctive royal guards too:

These lads were on their way to guard the crown jewels. And do the British royals have a lot of crown jewels? Yes.

That night it was time to change the scene a bit. From down town royal castles, to inner city Camden Town. We caught a Mexican wrestling (Lucha libre) show at the Roundhouse. Former railway shed, and then more famously, live music venue. These days it's been revamped into a theatre. The wrestling was a ridiculous, well choreographed show with oiled up men wearing masks. After the show we went back to the centre of London for a night on the turps.

We were supposed to have brunch on Sunday morning, but we scrapped that plan in favour of sleeping in again. Today was the main event: Wimbledon men's final. No, unfortunately I didn't have tickets, but being in London meant I could at least watch the final in daylight hours! True to form, it was raining by 1pm, and still raining at 2pm when the final was due to start. We headed into a sports bar, and settled for watching a very wet British Grand Prix.

Finally the weather cleared, and Federer and Nadal took the court for what was about to be an epic 5 set final. This being London on men's final Sunday, meant it wasn't going to be fine weather forever. Of course the match got interrupted again. When the weather forecaster said the delay would be at least an hour, we decided to head to Cynthia's, and watch the remainder of the final at her house. (We weren't even sure if it was going to be continued that day!)

The rest is history. The rain cleared, play continued, and Nadal broke Federer's five Wimbledon winning streak. We watched it in comfort at Cyn's place, eating some excellent sushi.

aussie rules karlstad

After the fun of a very Swedish midsummer's long weekend, the next weekend it was time to spice things up with a bit of a road trip in celebration of Australian culture. I hit the road with the Berserkers: the Göteborg Australian Rules Football Club to take on the Dragons from Karlstad.

Aussie rules has to be modified a bit to be played here. For example, we play on a rugby pitch, with nine players per side on the field. Since the pitch is fairly short, there was a one bounce limit before you had to pass.

Göteborg was boosted by a few ring-in's from Oslo: three Aussies! So the final make up of the Berserkers was 5 Aussies and 6 Swedes. It was a sunny day, with a moderate wind down the ground. We lost the toss and kicked into the wind in the first quarter. While slightly down at quarter time, a heated 2nd quarter made sure we were in front at half time by a goal. Unfortunately our ruck man was knocked out after a heavy tackle.

With the loss of the ruck man our mid-field was significantly weakened and Karlstad took full advantage kicking 6 or 7 goals in the first 10 minutes of the third quarter. It's not called the premiership quarter for nothing. From here we never recovered.

Karlstad def. Göteborg: 18.19.127 to 9.14.68.

Postscript: Mattias, the ruck who was knocked out, was at training the following Monday, suffering only a "slight" headache. Suffice to say, he opted out of the scratch match at the end.

midsummer's eve

Midsummer in Sweden is a big deal. It's the holiday of the year. Celebrations usually involve friends, family and lots and lots of spirits.

There can be nothing more Swedish than raising a May Pole, dancing around it singing about little frogs, then settling in for a hearty lunch of pickled herring, new season potatoes, and strawberry cake. Lunch should be punctuated with frequent drinking and singing.

Luckily for me, I was able to get involved thanks to a work mate, Anders, hosting some of us for midsummer's eve. I had company as well, Carmen joined me in Göteborg from London. Also from work there was a couple of Spaniards, a couple of Chinese, and a few more Swedes just to make sure it was a Swedish enough day!

Did I mention the May Pole?

What's it look like? Squint a bit and use only the slightest bit of imagination. Yup, that's right. It symbolises a giant cock being shoved into mother earth, hence kick starting another year of fertile ground, good crops, etc.

After the raising of the May Pole, kids and parents are encouraged to dance around the pole. One of the more popular songs is Små Grodorna, or Small Frog. Basically it goes something along the lines of: small frogs are funny to see, the have no ears, and no tail. And they go kvack ack ack, kvack ack ack.

That's a funny conversation to have over a few drinks: what do animals "say" in other languages. In Swedish, frogs say kvack, kvack, and definitely not ribbit! I forget some of the others now, but commonly ducks, dogs, pigs and birds say things other than quack, woof, oink and tweet in Spanish, Swedish and Chinese. Cats seem to be the only animal that is the same in all: meow.

It was hungry work standing in a park on a Friday afternoon, so soon enough we headed back to Anders' place for a traditional midsummer's eve lunch.

Note: when a Swede offers you "seal" don't jump to conclusions. They do not slaughter baby seals in celebration of midsummer... There's a nicer explanation, as we found out. The Swedish word for herring is sill... Actually the English speakers were fine, as the Swede's told us sill is herring, but the Spanish call herring, aringa, (which is actually an Italian word!). No wonder we were all a bit confused! But don't worry: if you are in Norway, and they offer you seal, then it's a good chance it actually is seal!

After a lunch and a few Aquavit's: O. P. Andersen, and Skåne, to name just two. We headed outside for a game of Kubb. This is an old Swedish game, where you take turns to throw sticks at each other... sort of...

The game is played informally in back yards and parks all over the country whenever the sun is out. The playing field is set up with six kubbs either side, and one king in the middle (pictured). There are six throwing sticks, and two opposting teams. The teams throws all six sticks in a turn to attempt to knock over the kubbs. Once one teams' kubbs are all knocked over, it's time to knock over the king. The king should not be knocked over until the very end, otherwise you lose instantly (kind of like the black ball in pool).

Kubb was really enjoyable. Standing around in the sunshine, talking, and occasionally throwing sticks (and insults). All in all midsummer's eve was really enjoyable! Thanks to Anders for hosting us.